What's Up Wednesday!

It's a little late, but here's what's up this week in my garden!! Lots of the Fall plantings are doing really well- I'm excited to see how they perform in the colder weather when it gets here. In the mean time, I am still enjoying lots of tomatoes, peppers, cukes, and the occasional onion!

Swiss chard! It's so pretty, and I don't like to eat it. I'll have to do a neighborhood trade, I suppose!

      A second round of sugar snap peas is establishing nicely
 

I'm now able to pick late-summer lettuce! :)

Will the pumpkins and zucchini grow big enough in time?

Last of the chamomile is blooming. 

This summer I've harvested about 2 half-pints for tea this winter!

 The mystery squash thing that I couldn't identify is a cantaloupe- What an awesome surprise!

The canning pantry is quickly filling. I've spent 5 or 6 evenings in the last month 

filling it up with goodies- canned corn and canned peaches just recently- yum! Time to set some canning and local eating goals for the season, I think!

What's up in your Garden this week? 

Harvesting garlic + quick & easy Zucchini recipe

Ah!!! How did it get to be July? I know, I know; the months passed in sequential order like they always do. But June just flew by and July snuck up on me! While I was caught off-guard, I did manage to tend my garden much more consistently than last year. Last year at this time, you looked out into the backyard and saw Wild Weed Land, and not in a fun, cannabis-inspired type of way. This year- vague order! Semi-management of weeds!

See?! Plz ignore crazy weeds in back :)

Go me. I have been successfully enjoying foods as they come into season (um how are strawberries gone already?), which is fun! This past week, it was garlic-harvesting time! "How do I tell when my garlic is ready to harvest?", you might be asking? There's an easy indicator- when the leaves of the plant are 1/2-2/3 brown, it's time to pull those babies out! Or when you get so excited and you start rationalizing; the leaves are really almost quite close to 1/3 brown and that's pretty much like 1/2 isn't it? That's when I knew. Pull those guys outta there, brush off some of the dirtiest dirt parts, but do not wash! You need to identify a warm, dry spot for your garlic to cure for the next 3-4 weeks!

My spot is here, in the un-air conditioned mudroom: 

Garlic!!!

Made a delicious meal tonight, very easy and light: Broiled Zucchini. Broiled is such an ugly word. Maybe we could call it something else like, "Zippy Zucchini". New official name. The recipe is too simple for me to even tell you in an organized fashion. Just turn your oven onto broil, mix some olive oil,   onions, garlic, thyme, salt, pepper, and lemon juice (I used limes!). Slice a zucchini up, and cut up a moderately-sized tomato (or several smaller ones), and mix it all together! Put on foil, and broil for 8-10 minutes. DONE! Deliciousness! Coolest thing about this dish? I know who grew each ingredient (ok minus the salt, pepper, olive oil, and lime). 

Mmmm.